Work Out While You Work

Many workers stuck behind a desk all day lament that they spend too much time sitting down and don't have enough time to exercise. A recent University of Chicago graduate has come up with a solution to this problem: a compact elliptical trainer that lets people work out while they work.

The Cubii exercise machine is the brainchild of Arnav Dalmia, who has formed a company called Fitness Cubed to sell and market the product. It can fit under any typical desk and comes with a mobile application that lets users track their progress through revolutions, distance, calories, and other factors. It also connects them to others using Cubii via social networks.

Dalmia told us he was inspired to design Cubii about a year and a half ago, when he started an internship at a corporate firm. "Having been very active during college, I started to feel very lethargic after sitting at my desk for most of my day. Around the same time, I came across an article that addressed the sitting disease and said, 'Sitting is killing you.'"

Cubii is a lightweight, portable elliptical machine people can use at their desk to work out while they work.(Source: Fitness Cubed)

The article -- which outlined how sitting is bad for people's posture, weight, and other health-related factors -- inspired Dalmia to look into options for exercising while working, such as treadmill desks and standing desks. However, those were not options for him, due to space and financial constraints. "I realized a number of people were in a similar situation like me. That is when I decided to build something that was affordable, compact, non-intrusive, and easily adaptable to your lifestyle."

Unlike the elliptical machines typically found at fitness centers, Cubii is quiet, so it won't distract others working around you. It also has been designed with comfortable foot angles, so people can use it without too much effort and without hitting their knees on the desk, Dalmia said. To ensure they're getting a workout, users can change the resistance, as they can on any typical elliptical machine.

Some of Cubii's internal parts are made of aluminum, but most exterior parts are made of a high-quality plastic, making it lightweight -- about 20 lb.

Arnav dalmia , exactly what i meant that harvesting the produced energy even in small sence can be helpfull . Like you said you guys are planning to introduce the energy harvesting and reusing it for the purpose of ell phone charging it can be a very good contribution .

That will be an excellent thing of generating the ener gy and then reusing it within the office . It is no necessar that we reuse the energy in very big form even utilization in the minute sence can help to contribute a lot .

No doubt its an excellent thing for people spending whole day on office desk. Sitting in one place without any exercise is not good for health at all . This device if placed in office under work desk canadd a great value to the employees

Hi Charles, The upper legs do the pushing but the device is low enough such that the knees do not hit the desk- that has been the primary objective. Please feel free to email me at arnavdalmia@gmail.com and we could talk more about it if you would like!

Focus on Fundamentals consists of 45-minute on-line classes that cover a host of technologies. You learn without leaving the comfort of your desk. All classes are taught by subject-matter experts and all are archived. So if you can't attend live, attend at your convenience.